## Facts

- Clark Zane Couch operated an Oregon game farm where customers paid to hunt nonindigenous deer, including fallow deer, axis deer, and sika deer.
- The State of Oregon charged Couch by information with more than four dozen alleged violations tied to the possession, sale, and hunting of those deer.
- The charges were based on Oregon wildlife statutes and rules issued and enforced by the Oregon Fish and Wildlife Commission.
- Couch filed a demurrer, arguing the commission’s rules were beyond the commission’s statutory authority as applied to his operation because its authority extended only to “wildlife,” and captive nonindigenous deer on a private game farm were not “wildlife” under the enabling statutes.
- The trial court agreed with Couch’s authority argument and dismissed the charges on demurrer.
- The state appealed, arguing that the trial court improperly resolved the authority dispute at the demurrer stage.

## Issues

1. Whether the information was legally sufficient on its face to charge violations of Oregon wildlife statutes and commission rules.
2. Whether the trial court erred by sustaining a demurrer based on a conclusion about the commission’s authority and the deer’s status that depended on facts not alleged in the information.

## Decision

- The Court of Appeals of Oregon reversed the order sustaining the demurrer and remanded for further proceedings.
- The court held that a demurrer tests the legal sufficiency of the charging instrument on its face and does not permit the trial court to decide factual matters or resolve an as-applied authority challenge that turns on facts outside the pleading.
- The court concluded that, on its face, the information alleged violations of statutes and commission rules and therefore stated offenses sufficient to proceed.
- The court left for later litigation (on an appropriate record and procedure) any dispute about whether the animals involved fell within the statutory category the commission may regulate.

## Legal Principles

- A criminal demurrer is confined to the “four corners” of the charging instrument and challenges only whether the facts alleged constitute an offense as a matter of law.
- On demurrer, the court assumes the truth of well-pleaded allegations and does not weigh evidence or find facts.
- A trial court may not sustain a demurrer by relying on factual assumptions not pleaded in the information.
- When the state alleges conduct that violates statutes and agency rules on their face, an argument that the rules are invalid as applied because of case-specific facts generally cannot be resolved on demurrer.

## Conclusion

The Oregon Court of Appeals held that the trial court improperly dismissed the prosecution on demurrer by deciding, based on facts not pleaded in the information, that the Fish and Wildlife Commission lacked authority to regulate Couch’s nonindigenous captive deer; because the information was facially sufficient, the dismissal was reversed and the case remanded.


State v. Couch, 103 P.3d 671 (2004)